01 November 2007

I survived my Halloween party...even better I managed to have a lot of fun despite all the cooking. My husband has a theory that I love Halloween so much because it gives me the opportunity to wear all of my eccentric treasures...the items that I knew were ridiculously impractical in the store, yet they were simply irresistible.For example, my collection of hats, my hot pink elbow length leather gloves, my fishnets...I continually changed my accessories throughout the party and even let some of my friends play dress up too.

As I meandered through the grocery store collecting the goodies for my party I started to think about how much my entertaining style has changed over the years. When I began my career as a hostess I would invite every single person I knew to my party via evite. These days I choose to curate the guest list and perhaps even hand out real invitations. This is not necessarily because I like the people who end up getting invited more, it is because I'm looking for a certain balance in the guest list. If more than one group of friends is invited I don't want the party to be overwhelmed by any one clique. I still inevitably end up feeling a little guilty about this, but its better that all my guests feel comfortable than to have a friend from the gym overwhelmed and excluded by 50 people from work talking shop.

The invites are not the only thing that has changed: the food and booze has seen a considerable upgrade. Unfortunately, with a transition from pretzels and cheetos to risotto and quiche comes a serious increase in preparation time. I thought that I had done fairly well in choose lots of semi-premade goodies to serve at the party, but I still ended up cooking for the first half of the party...tragic! I think the thing that made me the most cranky was the fact that all of my guests had to look at my disastrous kitchen. I am looking forward to the day when I can upgrade to a home with a closed off kitchen, so that my my mess stays hidden from my entertaining space. I would also love to reach the level where I can hire someone to come in and finish off the last little bit of cooking, keep the platters stocked with food and keep guests glasses full!